When Amazon switched over to "frustration free" packaging last year—using minimal materials to ease the strain on the environment—they unwittingly became the prime suspect in a string of hard disk drive deaths. Behold the trail of sorrow:

I'm 100% certain I'm not alone when I say I hate gadget packaging—specifically the…
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Apparently, multiple customers who've ordered Western Digital HDDs have found that their order was wrapped in just a bag and some "cardboard hoops." The reviews say it all: Amazon has cut down a swath of innocent hard disk drives before their time:

"Like other users complained it was shipped with no protection at all. Imagine ordering a book, that's exactly how this harddrive was shipped. Not even the plastic that holds it down when you fold it. I can only imagine what this did to the life expectancy of this drive."

"The defect in this box was the tab that secures the internal supports broke free (either due to assembly error-or it broke free in transit). Either way I can't trust the drive to not fail on me in a few days/weeks/months."

"Dead on Arrival! The shipping box and lack of packing material was just not up to the job. I was a little suspicious when I heard the slight rattle as I installed it in my Power Mac G5. Then came the ominous "tic..tic...tic", silence, then "tic...tic" of a drive that is dead."

The horror! And all so young!

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Fortunately, according to Wired, Amazon has since changed their packaging policy for this specific item. But who knows how many other hard disk drives are at risk? [Wired]